Academy Award

HISTORY

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) was founded in Los Angeles on May 11, 1927, with just 230 members. One of its first committees suggested it might be a good idea to hold an annual award ceremony — and the Oscars was born.

The first Academy Awards ceremony, presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences honored the best films of 1927 and 1928 and took place on May 16, 1929, at a private dinner held at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel in Los Angeles. AMPAS president Douglas Fairbanks hosted the show.

The first Academy Awards was at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel. Date, May 16, 1929 ...

The first winner of the Academy Award for Best Picture, and the only silent film to achieve that honor, was the 1927 movie, Wings.

Only 12 awards were given out at the first Oscars and the entire ceremony lasted just 15 minutes.

The guests at the first Academy Awards ceremony knew who had won three months in advance but still paid $5 a ticket for their seats.

The Academy Award was rumored to have gotten its nickname of Oscar for its resemblance to a film librarian’s Uncle Oscar.

Hattie McDaniel became the first African American to be awarded an Oscar, winning Best Supporting Actress for her role as Mammy in Gone with the Wind at the 1940 Academy Awards. When McDaniel won she was seated at a segregated table at the back of the room.

After winning her Academy Award, McDaniel was accused of being an Uncle Tom by the NAACP to which she responded that she would, "rather make seven hundred dollars a week playing a maid than seven dollars being one".

Hattie McDaniel studio publicity photo

The Academy Awards were first broadcast on television by NBC on March 19, 1953; The first color broadcast was in 1966.

Sidney Poitier became on April 13, 1964 the first African-American male to win the Best Actor Academy Award for the 1963 film Lilies of the Field. The film tells the story of an itinerant worker who helps a group of nuns build a chapel in the desert. Poitier's performance in the film was widely praised and his win was seen as a major milestone for African-American actors in Hollywood, who had long been marginalized and excluded from many leading roles. 

Sidney Poitier won in 1963 for his performance in Lilies of the Field, thus 

RECORDS

The youngest movie star to win an Academy Award was Shirley Temple who won an Oscar in 1934 at the age of 6.

The longest Oscar acceptance speech was made by Greer Garson for 1942's Mrs. Miniver. It took an hour.

The shortest Oscar speech ever was given by 16-year-old Patty Duke in 1962.  The winner of Best Supporting Actress for her role as Helen Keller in The Miracle Worker (1962), Duke said "Thank You", then walked off the stage.

Actress Tatum O’Neal is the youngest Oscar winner in history. She accepted the trophy for best supporting actress for her role as Addie in Paper Moon in 1973 when she was 10-years-old.

Jessica Tandy is the oldest winner of an Academy Award. She won the 1989 Best Actress award for Driving Miss Daisy at the age of 80 years and 9 months. She beat George Burns for that distinction by just a few months.

Christopher Plummer is the oldest winner in any acting category; he was 82 when he won for the 2010 movie Beginners.

Clint Eastwood became the oldest person to win the Best Director Oscar when on February 27, 2005, at age of 74, he won the gong for Million Dollar Baby.

Bob Hope holds the record for hosting the most Academy Awards, having emceed or co-emceed 19 ceremonies between 1940 and 1978.

Composer John Williams is the most Oscar-nominated living person - with 54 nominations and five wins. Walt Disney holds the all-time nomination record with 59. 

Peter O'Toole was nominated for eight Academy Awards. He holds the record of having the most nominations for an acting Oscar without winning.

Hollywood sound man Greg P Russell holds the record for most Academy Award nominations with no wins. He's been nominated 17 times for 17 different films.

Sound mixer Kevin O'Connell did hold the record for most Oscar nominations without a win: 20. He finally won for Hacksaw Ridge at the 2017 ceremony.

Steven Spielberg is the most thanked person in Oscar acceptance speeches. God is #6 just behind Peter Jackson.

Films that have won most Oscars are Ben-Hur (1952), Titanic (1997) and Lord Of The Rings: Return Of The King (2003), which each won 11.

In 1986, both The Color Purple and Out Of Africa received 11 Oscar nominations without winning any. This is also a record.

FUN OSCAR FACTS

A ventriloquist's dummy won an Oscar in 1937. Charlie McCarthy, a wooden dummy invented by Edgar Bergen, father of film star Candice Bergen, won it for best comedy creation

Only one man named Oscar has won an Oscar. He was Oscar Hammerstein who won two Academy Awards in the 1940s from lyrics to The Last Time I Saw Paris and It Might As Well Be Spring.

The most famous Oscar tie ever was in 1969 when Barbra Streisand and Katharine Hepburn tied for Best Actress.

Kenneth Branagh is the first actor ever to be nominated in five different Oscar categories: Best Director, Actor, Adapted Screenplay, Live-Action Short and Supporting Actor. He’s yet to win one.

Three movies have swept the top five major awards (best picture, actor, actress, director and screenplay). Those films were, It Happened One Night (1934), One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975) and The Silence of the Lambs (1991).

Anthony Hopkins won the Best Actor Oscar for Silence of the Lambs with only 16 minutes of screentime.

Sylvester Stallone is the only actor that has two Academy Award nominations for playing the same character, (Rocky Balboa) 39 years apart.

Cate Blanchett's Academy Award for playing Katherine Hepburn in The Aviator made her the only actor to win an Oscar for portraying another Oscar-winning actor.

Matthew McConaughey turned down a whopping $15 million to play Magnum Pi in favor of less than $200,000 to star in Dallas Buyers Club. He was compensated with the 2014 Best Actor Oscar.

An Oscar trophy weighs 8.5 pounds and stands 13.5 inches tall. Clutching an Oscar feels like holding a gallon of milk.

Wikipedia

One thing Academy Award winners can’t do is sell their statue for a profit. Since 1950, recipients have been required to sign an agreement promising that neither they nor their heirs will sell their statuette without first offering it back to the Academy for $1.

The actual Oscar award trophy is estimated to be worth about $150.

The model for the Oscar statuette is said to have been Mexican actor Emilio Fernandez.

Kate Winslet keeps her Oscar for The Reader in the bathroom so her guests can hold it and make acceptance speeches in the mirror without feeling self conscious.

Jack Nicholson is said to have used one of his Oscar trophies as a hat stand.

Here is a list of songs that won Oscars

Sources: Daily Express, International Business Times